Rewards

: Warlord Of Mars

With the realization that Dejah Thoris was no longer within the

throneroom came the belated recollection of the dark face that I had

glimpsed peering from behind the draperies that backed the throne

of Salensus Oll at the moment that I had first come so unexpectedly

upon the strange scene being enacted within the chamber.



Why had the sight of that evil countenance not warned me to greater

caution? Why ha I permitted the rapid development of new situations

to efface the recollection of that menacing danger? But, alas,

vain regret would not erase the calamity that had befallen.



Once again had Dejah Thoris fallen into the clutches of that

archfiend, Thurid, the black dator of the First Born. Again was

all my arduous labor gone for naught. Now I realized the cause

of the rage that had been writ so large upon the features of Matai

Shang and the cruel pleasure that I had seen upon the face of

Phaidor.



They had known or guessed the truth, and the hekkador of the

Holy Therns, who had evidently come to the chamber in the hope of

thwarting Salensus Oll in his contemplated perfidy against the high

priest who coveted Dejah Thoris for himself, realized that Thurid

had stolen the prize from beneath his very nose.



Phaidor's pleasure had been due to her realization of what this last

cruel blow would mean to me, as well as to a partial satisfaction

of her jealous hatred for the Princess of Helium.



My first thought was to look beyond the draperies at the back of

the throne, for there it was that I had seen Thurid. With a single

jerk I tore the priceless stuff from its fastenings, and there

before me was revealed a narrow doorway behind the throne.



No question entered my mind but that here lay the opening of the

avenue of escape which Thurid had followed, and had there been it

would have been dissipated by the sight of a tiny, jeweled ornament

which lay a few steps within the corridor beyond.



As I snatched up the bauble I saw that it bore the device of the

Princess of Helium, and then pressing it to my lips I dashed madly

along the winding way that led gently downward toward the lower

galleries of the palace.



I had followed but a short distance when I came upon the room in

which Solan formerly had held sway. His dead body still lay where

I had left it, nor was there any sign that another had passed

through the room since I had been there; but I knew that two had

done so--Thurid, the black dator, and Dejah Thoris.



For a moment I paused uncertain as to which of the several exits

from the apartment would lead me upon the right path. I tried to

recollect the directions which I had heard Thurid repeat to Solan,

and at last, slowly, as though through a heavy fog, the memory of

the words of the First Born came to me:



"Follow a corridor, passing three diverging corridors upon the right;

then into the fourth right-hand corridor to where three corridors

meet; here again follow to the right, hugging the left wall closely

to avoid the pit. At the end of this corridor I shall come to a

spiral runway which I must follow down instead of up; after that

the way is along but a single branchless corridor."



And I recalled the exit at which he had pointed as he spoke.



It did not take me long to start upon that unknown way, nor did I

go with caution, although I knew that there might be grave dangers

before me.



Part of the way was black as sin, but for the most it was fairly

well lighted. The stretch where I must hug the left wall to avoid

the pits was darkest of them all, and I was nearly over the edge of

the abyss before I knew that I was near the danger spot. A narrow

ledge, scarce a foot wide, was all that had been left to carry

the initiated past that frightful cavity into which the unknowing

must surely have toppled at the first step. But at last I had won

safely beyond it, and then a feeble light made the balance of the

way plain, until, at the end of the last corridor, I came suddenly

out into the glare of day upon a field of snow and ice.



Clad for the warm atmosphere of the hothouse city of Kadabra, the

sudden change to arctic frigidity was anything but pleasant; but

the worst of it was that I knew I could not endure the bitter cold,

almost naked as I was, and that I would perish before ever I could

overtake Thurid and Dejah Thoris.



To be thus blocked by nature, who had had all the arts and wiles

of cunning man pitted against him, seemed a cruel fate, and as I

staggered back into the warmth of the tunnel's end I was as near

hopelessness as I ever have been.



I had by no means given up my intention of continuing the pursuit,

for if needs be I would go ahead though I perished ere ever I

reached my goal, but if there were a safer way it were well worth

the delay to attempt to discover it, that I might come again to

the side of Dejah Thoris in fit condition to do battle for her.



Scarce had I returned to the tunnel than I stumbled over a portion

of a fur garment that seemed fastened to the floor of the corridor

close to the wall. In the darkness I could not see what held it,

but by groping with my hands I discovered that it was wedged beneath

the bottom of a closed door.



Pushing the portal aside, I found myself upon the threshold of a

small chamber, the walls of which were lined with hooks from which

depended suits of the complete outdoor apparel of the yellow men.



Situated as it was at the mouth of a tunnel leading from the palace,

it was quite evident that this was the dressing-room used by the

nobles leaving and entering the hothouse city, and that Thurid,

having knowledge of it, had stopped here to outfit himself and

Dejah Thoris before venturing into the bitter cold of the arctic

world beyond.



In his haste he had dropped several garments upon the floor, and

the telltale fur that had fallen partly within the corridor had

proved the means of guiding me to the very spot he would least have

wished me to have knowledge of.



It required but the matter of a few seconds to don the necessary

orluk-skin clothing, with the heavy, fur-lined boots that are so

essential a part of the garmenture of one who would successfully

contend with the frozen trails and the icy winds of the bleak

northland.



Once more I stepped beyond the tunnel's mouth to find the fresh

tracks of Thurid and Dejah Thoris in the new-fallen snow. Now, at

last, was my task an easy one, for though the going was rough in

the extreme, I was no longer vexed by doubts as to the direction

I should follow, or harassed by darkness or hidden dangers.



Through a snow-covered canyon the way led up toward the summit of

low hills. Beyond these it dipped again into another canon, only

to rise a quarter-mile farther on toward a pass which skirted the

flank of a rocky hill.



I could see by the signs of those who had gone before that when Dejah

Thoris had walked she had been continually holding back, and that

the black man had been compelled to drag her. For other stretches

only his foot-prints were visible, deep and close together in

the heavy snow, and I knew from these signs that then he had been

forced to carry her, and I could well imagine that she had fought

him fiercely every step of the way.



As I came round the jutting promontory of the hill's shoulder I saw

that which quickened my pulses and set my heart to beating high,

for within a tiny basin between the crest of this hill and the next

stood four people before the mouth of a great cave, and beside them

upon the gleaming snow rested a flier which had evidently but just

been dragged from its hiding place.



The four were Dejah Thoris, Phaidor, Thurid, and Matai Shang. The

two men were engaged in a heated argument--the Father of Therns

threatening, while the black scoffed at him as he went about the

work at which he was engaged.



As I crept toward them cautiously that I might come as near as

possible before being discovered, I saw that finally the men appeared

to have reached some sort of a compromise, for with Phaidor's

assistance they both set about dragging the resisting Dejah Thoris

to the flier's deck.



Here they made her fast, and then both again descended to the ground

to complete the preparations for departure. Phaidor entered the

small cabin upon the vessel's deck.



I had come to within a quarter of a mile of them when Matai Shang

espied me. I saw him seize Thurid by the shoulder, wheeling him

around in my direction as he pointed to where I was now plainly

visible, for the moment that I knew I had been perceived I cast

aside every attempt at stealth and broke into a mad race for the

flier.



The two redoubled their efforts at the propeller at which they were

working, and which very evidently was being replaced after having

been removed for some purpose of repair.



They had the thing completed before I had covered half the distance

that lay between me and them, and then both made a rush for the

boarding-ladder.



Thurid was the first to reach it, and with the agility of a monkey

clambered swiftly to the boat's deck, where a touch of the button

controlling the buoyancy tanks sent the craft slowly upward, though

not with the speed that marks the well-conditioned flier.



I was still some hundred yards away as I saw them rising from my

grasp.



Back by the city of Kadabra lay a great fleet of mighty fliers--the

ships of Helium and Ptarth that I had saved from destruction earlier

in the day; but before ever I could reach them Thurid could easily

make good his escape.



As I ran I saw Matai Shang clambering up the swaying, swinging

ladder toward the deck, while above him leaned the evil face of the

First Born. A trailing rope from the vessel's stern put new hope

in me, for if I could but reach it before it whipped too high above

my head there was yet a chance to gain the deck by its slender aid.



That there was something radically wrong with the flier was evident

from its lack of buoyancy, and the further fact that though Thurid

had turned twice to the starting lever the boat still hung motionless

in the air, except for a slight drifting with a low breeze from

the north.



Now Matai Shang was close to the gunwale. A long, claw-like hand

was reaching up to grasp the metal rail.



Thurid leaned farther down toward his co-conspirator.



Suddenly a raised dagger gleamed in the upflung hand of the black.

Down it drove toward the white face of the Father of Therns. With

a loud shriek of fear the Holy Hekkador grasped frantically at that

menacing arm.



I was almost to the trailing rope by now. The craft was still

rising slowly, the while it drifted from me. Then I stumbled on

the icy way, striking my head upon a rock as I fell sprawling but

an arm's length from the rope, the end of which was now just leaving

the ground.



With the blow upon my head came unconsciousness.



It could not have been more than a few seconds that I lay senseless

there upon the northern ice, while all that was dearest to me

drifted farther from my reach in the clutches of that black fiend,

for when I opened my eyes Thurid and Matai Shang yet battled at the

ladder's top, and the flier drifted but a hundred yards farther to

the south--but the end of the trailing rope was now a good thirty

feet above the ground.



Goaded to madness by the cruel misfortune that had tripped me when

success was almost within my grasp, I tore frantically across the

intervening space, and just beneath the rope's dangling end I put

my earthly muscles to the supreme test.



With a mighty, catlike bound I sprang upward toward that slender

strand--the only avenue which yet remained that could carry me to

my vanishing love.



A foot above its lowest end my fingers closed. Tightly as I clung

I felt the rope slipping, slipping through my grasp. I tried to

raise my free hand to take a second hold above my first, but the

change of position that resulted caused me to slip more rapidly

toward the end of the rope.



Slowly I felt the tantalizing thing escaping me. In a moment all

that I had gained would be lost--then my fingers reached a knot at

the very end of the rope and slipped no more.



With a prayer of gratitude upon my lips I scrambled upward toward

the boat's deck. I could not see Thurid and Matai Shang now,

but I heard the sounds of conflict and thus knew that they still

fought--the thern for his life and the black for the increased

buoyancy that relief from the weight of even a single body would

give the craft.



Should Matai Shang die before I reached the deck my chances of ever

reaching it would be slender indeed, for the black dator need but

cut the rope above me to be freed from me forever, for the vessel

had drifted across the brink of a chasm into whose yawning depths

my body would drop to be crushed to a shapeless pulp should Thurid

reach the rope now.



At last my hand closed upon the ship's rail and that very instant

a horrid shriek rang out below me that sent my blood cold and turned

my horrified eyes downward to a shrieking, hurtling, twisting thing

that shot downward into the awful chasm beneath me.



It was Matai Shang, Holy Hekkador, Father of Therns, gone to his

last accounting.



Then my head came above the deck and I saw Thurid, dagger in hand,

leaping toward me. He was opposite the forward end of the cabin,

while I was attempting to clamber aboard near the vessel's stern.

But a few paces lay between us. No power on earth could raise me

to that deck before the infuriated black would be upon me.



My end had come. I knew it; but had there been a doubt in my mind

the nasty leer of triumph upon that wicked face would have convinced

me. Beyond Thurid I could see my Dejah Thoris, wide-eyed and

horrified, struggling at her bonds. That she should be forced to

witness my awful death made my bitter fate seem doubly cruel.



I ceased my efforts to climb across the gunwale. Instead I took

a firm grasp upon the rail with my left hand and drew my dagger.



I should at least die as I had lived--fighting.



As Thurid came opposite the cabin's doorway a new element projected

itself into the grim tragedy of the air that was being enacted upon

the deck of Matai Shang's disabled flier.



It was Phaidor.



With flushed face and disheveled hair, and eyes that betrayed the

recent presence of mortal tears--above which this proud goddess had

always held herself--she leaped to the deck directly before me.



In her hand was a long, slim dagger. I cast a last look upon

my beloved princess, smiling, as men should who are about to die.

Then I turned my face up toward Phaidor--waiting for the blow.



Never have I seen that beautiful face more beautiful than it was

at that moment. It seemed incredible that one so lovely could

yet harbor within her fair bosom a heart so cruel and relentless,

and today there was a new expression in her wondrous eyes that I

never before had seen there--an unfamiliar softness, and a look of

suffering.



Thurid was beside her now--pushing past to reach me first, and

then what happened happened so quickly that it was all over before

I could realize the truth of it.



Phaidor's slim hand shot out to close upon the black's dagger wrist.

Her right hand went high with its gleaming blade.



"That for Matai Shang!" she cried, and she buried her blade deep

in the dator's breast. "That for the wrong you would have done

Dejah Thoris!" and again the sharp steel sank into the bloody flesh.



"And that, and that, and that!" she shrieked, "for John Carter,

Prince of Helium," and with each word her sharp point pierced the

vile heart of the great villain. Then, with a vindictive shove she

cast the carcass of the First Born from the deck to fall in awful

silence after the body of his victim.



I had been so paralyzed by surprise that I had made no move to reach

the deck during the awe-inspiring scene which I had just witnessed,

and now I was to be still further amazed by her next act, for

Phaidor extended her hand to me and assisted me to the deck, where

I stood gazing at her in unconcealed and stupefied wonderment.



A wan smile touched her lips--it was not the cruel and haughty

smile of the goddess with which I was familiar. "You wonder, John

Carter," she said, "what strange thing has wrought this change in

me? I will tell you. It is love--love of you," and when I darkened

my brows in disapproval of her words she raised an appealing hand.



"Wait," she said. "It is a different love from mine--it is the

love of your princess, Dejah Thoris, for you that has taught me

what true love may be--what it should be, and how far from real

love was my selfish and jealous passion for you.



"Now I am different. Now could I love as Dejah Thoris loves, and

so my only happiness can be to know that you and she are once more

united, for in her alone can you find true happiness.



"But I am unhappy because of the wickedness that I have wrought. I

have many sins to expiate, and though I be deathless, life is all

too short for the atonement.



"But there is another way, and if Phaidor, daughter of the Holy

Hekkador of the Holy Therns, has sinned she has this day already

made partial reparation, and lest you doubt the sincerity of her

protestations and her avowal of a new love that embraces Dejah

Thoris also, she will prove her sincerity in the only way that

lies open--having saved you for another, Phaidor leaves you to her

embraces."



With her last word she turned and leaped from the vessel's deck

into the abyss below.



With a cry of horror I sprang forward in a vain attempt to save the

life that for two years I would so gladly have seen extinguished.

I was too late.



With tear-dimmed eyes I turned away that I might not see the awful

sight beneath.



A moment later I had struck the bonds from Dejah Thoris, and as her

dear arms went about my neck and her perfect lips pressed to mine

I forgot the horrors that I had witnessed and the suffering that

I had endured in the rapture of my reward.